First published as a 20-part serial between December 1855 and June 1857, Charles Dickens’s Little Dorrit served to expose several social abuses of interest to its author, including rampant financial corruption and an incompetent civil service, where members were appointed through favoritism. At first, Dickens intended to explore the theme that such conditions were claimed to be “Nobody’s fault,” and he considered that phrase as the novel’s title. He rendered a discouraging view of the effects of Britain’s economic and social system on its citizens. The Circumlocution Office is composed of self-satisfied figures who block all promotion of good for the common man.

The main plot in this dark novel involves a family named Dorrit and centers on Amy Dorrit, nicknamed “Little Dorrit.” Amy was born in the prison Marshalsea, where her father, William, has spent so much time as a debtor that he is known as “the father of Marshalsea.” Like Dickens’s Bleak House (1853), Little Dorrit incorporates aspects of the Gothic to bring an air of horror to the tale. Dickens also similarly offers several plot lines that appear unrelated at first, set in London, Marseille, and also Italy. The characters eventually connect with one another in a plot that Jane Smiley has labeled “overelaborate and creaky,” filled with many uninteresting figures.

Amy’s bright disposition keeps hopes alive for a happy future, as she and her father find a friend in Arthur Clennam, newly returned to England after having lived abroad. He tries to care for his mother, a bitter, gloomy paralyzed figure whose dark and foreboding house symbolizes her bigotry and misanthropy. Clennam helps Amy take a job sewing for Mrs. Clennam, who becomes involved with the French villain, Rigaud/Blandois, and his partner in crime, Jeremiah Flintwich. Dickens depicts Mrs. Flintwich as a victim of her husband’s and Mrs. Clennam’s abuse, with her visions that become reality adding a touch of mysticism to the novel. The collapse of Mrs. Clennam’s frightening house symbolizes the eventual decay of her own life, which lacks foundation in any faith in her fellow man. An additional wicked figure meant to represent hypocrisy is Mr. Casby, a supposed humanitarian who spouts morality while supporting himself with income from slum houses that he rents at exorbitant fees to the poor.

William and Amy eventually leave the prison, and through an inheritance, the family becomes wealthy, traveling to Italy. William dies there a broken man, remembering only his experiences in prison, representing the inability of money to heal deep wounds. Meanwhile, Clennam struggles with the Circumlocution Office in London, where Merdle, a millionaire speculator praised by church and state alike, draws Clennam and others into a fraud that lands Clennam in the Marshalsea. Merdle’s eventual suicide acts as a heavy-handed caution by Dickens to those who prey on others, while he incorporates his era’s attitude toward the Circumlocution Office as representing the worst of government’s meaningless activities. Little Dorrit returns to the Marshalsea and finds Clennam. In contrast to her siblings, who have assumed the pretensions expected of the wealthy, Amy remains untouched by money’s evils. Generous and without guile, she lacks her sibling’s social aspirations, valuing her love for Clennam more. He eventually recognizes that love and, after the Dorrits lose their fortune, the two are able to make a life together.

Dickens incorporates some real-life and autobiographical aspects into his novel. The imprisonment for debt of his own family during his childhood had already been used in David Copperfield (1850), but it is explored in more depth in Little Dorrit. The Micawber figure in David Copperfield was a comic representation of Dickens’s father, while William Dorrit is much more serious and realistic. Disgusted by what he viewed as governmental blunders during the Crimean War, Dickens sketched most government offices as nothing more than bureaucratic boondoggles. He based Merdle on the real figure of John Sadleir, a financial promoter who killed himself in 1856.

Dickens also includes his trademark humorous characters, such as Mrs. General, a venerable lady who lives up to her name. Mr. Dorrit hires her to be a traveling companion for Amy following their social elevation due to his inheritance. A woman of “high style” and “composure,” others testify as to her “piety, learning, virtue, and gentility,” with one archdeacon even weeping at the thought of her perfection. She accepts the offer to accompany the Dorrits to the Alps, thinking she might help to “form the mind” of Amy Dorrit. Her absurd moralizing and philosophizing help to lighten an otherwise often dark tone. In a like turn, Mrs. Winter, at first annoyingly repugnant as a drinker and a silly flirt, proves that she possesses compassion, a quality highly valued in Dickens’s characters. She understands her faults, making her a strong foil for Mrs. General, who deems herself perfect in every way.

Little Dorrit proved popular with Dickens’s readers. It was converted to various media versions and remains readily available in both print and electronic form.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Schlicke, Paul, ed. The Oxford Reader’s Companion to Dickens. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Smiley, Jane. Charles Dickens. New York: Viking, 2002.